Grace Nichols, Picasso, I Want My Face Back

Pavlina Flajsarova (Palacky University Olomouc)
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Similarly to her previous volumes, including

i is a long-memoried woman

(1983) and

The Fat Black Woman’s Poems

(1984), in her 2009

Picasso, I Want My Face Back

(hereafter

Picasso

) Grace Nichols focuses on race and ethnicity, addressing this theme within British Caribbean diasporic and feminist contexts. In the text‘s four sections, Nichols shifts her focus between speakers who are firmly embedded in Caribbean culture and speakers from different national or ethnic backgrounds and, therefore, the use of Caribbean patois is less pronounced than in her other collections. However, Nichols still thematises British Guyana, the land of her childhood, to show that Britain remains a hostile diasporic place, whereas the Caribbean always provides consolation in times of sorrow. Sarah Lawson Welsh…

2136 words

Citation: Flajsarova, Pavlina. "Picasso, I Want My Face Back". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 15 June 2022 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=38915, accessed 29 March 2024.]

38915 Picasso, I Want My Face Back 3 Historical context notes are intended to give basic and preliminary information on a topic. In some cases they will be expanded into longer entries as the Literary Encyclopedia evolves.

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